Creators & Freelancers

What should I charge as a freelancer?

You have to charge about twice the salaried hourly wage just to take home the salaried pay. Not to do better than the job you left. To break even with it. A graphic designer on staff earns $30.27 an hour; to end up with the same money freelancing, you have to bill somewhere around $69.

Three things do it, and only one of them is obvious. First, you pay BOTH halves of payroll tax: an employee pays 7.65% and never sees the employer quietly paying the other 7.65%, while a self-employed person pays all 15.3%, on 92.35% of net earnings, which works out at 14.13% of profit. That is the IRS's arithmetic, not ours. Second, you do not bill forty hours a week, because nobody does: the hours you spend selling, invoicing, chasing and doing your own books are hours you cannot invoice, and if you bill 60% of your week then every billable hour has to carry the other 40%. Third, you buy the laptop, the software, the insurance and the accountant, all of which an employer buys without ever itemising them for you. Put your own numbers in below. The wage comes from BLS and the tax comes from the IRS; the working weeks, the billable share and the expenses are yours, because they are the numbers everything turns on and we are not going to guess at them for you.

§ 01 Your numbers

Change anything. The answer updates as you type.

The job you would otherwise be doing

BLS's median ANNUAL wage for the occupation, from its survey of what employed people in that job actually earn. Picking one sets the target below.

This is the number you are trying to match: what you would take home if you took the salaried job instead. BLS surveys the occupation directly, so it needs no industry bucket to find one. It EXCLUDES the self-employed, which is exactly what we want here: it is the wage of the job you did not take.

That job's hourly wage, on staff

Set by the job above. It is here so you can see what you are comparing against, and so you can change it if you know the real figure for your city.

It is a MEDIAN, so half the people in that job earn less. BLS publishes a wage by state as well, and the spread is wide: a graphic designer's median ranges more than twofold across the country.

Weeks you actually work in a year

An employee gets paid for their holidays and their sick days. You do not. Forty-eight weeks assumes four weeks off, unpaid.

This is one of the three numbers that decides everything, and it is yours. If you take two weeks off, put 50. If you are ill for a month, that month is unpaid and the rate you needed was higher than you thought.

Hours you work in a week

The hours you are AT work, billable or not.

Of those hours, the share you actually invoice (%)

This is the number people get most wrong, and it is OURS only as a default: 60% is a common working figure and it is yours to change.

The hours you spend selling, quoting, invoicing, chasing late payers, doing your books, updating your portfolio and answering emails are hours you cannot invoice. They are still work. If you bill 60% of your week, every billable hour has to carry the other 40%. Set it to 100 if you genuinely invoice every hour you work, and the calculator will not argue with you.

Business expenses for the year

The laptop, the software subscriptions, the insurance, the accountant, the phone, the desk. An employer buys all of it and never itemises it for you.

This is YOUR number and there is no federal source for it, so we default it to a plausible figure and hand it straight back to you. It is deductible, which is why the calculator adds it to the revenue you need rather than taxing it.

What you have to bill, an hour

$69

What you want to take home (the salaried wage for this job)$62,960
Self-employment tax the employer used to pay half of (IRS: 15.3% on 92.35% of net)$10,360
Business expenses an employer would have bought for you$6,000

See next steps →

You have to charge about twice the salaried hourly wage to take home the salaried pay. A graphic designer on staff earns $30.27 an hour. To end up with the same money freelancing, on ordinary assumptions, you have to bill somewhere around $69. That is not a markup and it is not greed. It is the arithmetic of not having an employer.

You pay both halves of payroll tax, and this is the part nobody tells you. An employee pays 7.65%. The employer pays the other 7.65%, quietly, and it never appears on the payslip. A self-employed person pays all 15.3%, on 92.35% of net earnings, which comes to 14.13% of profit. That is the Internal Revenue Code, not our opinion, and it is the single biggest reason the "my salary divided by 2,080 hours" rate is wrong. You do not bill forty hours a week. The hours you spend selling, quoting, invoicing, chasing late payers, doing your books and updating your portfolio are hours you cannot invoice, and they are still work. If you invoice 60% of your week, every billable hour has to carry the other 40%. That number is an input on this page because it is the one that decides everything, and because we are not going to guess it for you. And you buy what an employer used to buy. The laptop, the software, the insurance, the accountant, the desk. None of it appeared on a payslip either. What is sourced and what is yours. The wage is BLS's, from its survey of what employed people in that job actually earn. The tax rates are statutory. The working weeks, the billable share and the expenses are YOURS, they are inputs, and they are handed back to you rather than dressed up as statistics.

§ 02 The rate you actually need

Hours a year you can actually invoice1,152 hours

The naive rate (salary divided by 2,080 hours)$30.27

Self-employment tax on that take-home (IRS)$10,360

Your rate, as a multiple of the staff wage2.30

The wage is BLS's and the tax is the IRS's. The working weeks, the billable share and the expenses are yours: they are the numbers everything turns on, they are inputs, and the defaults are starting points rather than findings. This page computes the rate that matches a salary. It does not know what your market will pay, and it does not pretend to.

Recommended next steps

Roughly twice the staff wage is what it takes to end up level, and that is where your numbers land. It is not a markup, it is the cost of not having an employer. If it feels high, the thing to look at is the billable share rather than the rate.

By the numbers

A freelancer pays BOTH halves of payroll tax. An employee pays 7.65% and never sees the employer paying the other 7.65%.
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Self-employment tax is 15.3%, levied on 92.35% of net earnings, which comes to 14.13% of profit. It is the Social Security half (12.4%) plus the Medicare half (2.9%). An employer splits that with an employee and the employee's payslip only ever shows their share. When you go freelance, the employer's half does not disappear. It becomes yours.
Nobody bills forty hours out of forty, and the unpaid hours are still work.
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Selling. Quoting. Invoicing. Chasing the client who has not paid. Bookkeeping. Updating the portfolio. Answering emails that turn into nothing. If you invoice 60% of your week, every billable hour has to carry the other 40%, which multiplies the rate you need by a two-thirds again. It is the number people get most wrong, and it is an input on this page for exactly that reason.
A graphic designer on staff earns $30.27 an hour. Freelance, you need about $69 to end up with the same money.
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BLS's median for the occupation is $62,960 a year, $30.27 an hour. To be left with that after self-employment tax, you have to make about $73,300 in profit. Add expenses an employer would have bought, and divide by the hours you can actually invoice rather than the hours you work, and the rate you need is more than twice the staff wage. It comes out at roughly the same multiple for every occupation we checked.
An employee is paid for their holidays. You are not, and that is four weeks of the year.
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The default here is 48 working weeks, which assumes four weeks off, unpaid. If you are ill for a month, that month is unpaid too, and the rate you needed was higher than you thought it was. Set the weeks to whatever is true for you.
BLS's wage EXCLUDES the self-employed, which is exactly what makes it the right comparison here.
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In BLS's own words: 'Does OEWS have occupational employment estimates that include the self-employed? No.' So it is the wage of people who took the job. Which is precisely the number you want, because the question this page answers is: what would I have earned if I had not gone freelance?
Nobody publishes what a freelancer should charge, and this page does not pretend to.
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What it computes is the rate that matches a salary, which is arithmetic. What the market will actually pay you is a different question, and this page does not answer it: BLS surveys the employed, and the IRS publishes tax rates rather than prices. If your market will not bear the number this page produces, that is worth knowing too, and it is not a failure of the arithmetic.

Sourced: the wage (BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025) and the tax (Internal Revenue Code: 15.3% self-employment tax levied on 92.35% of net earnings). Ours: nothing at all. The weeks, the hours, the billable share and the expenses are your inputs, and the defaults are starting points, not findings.

What this page computes, and what it does not. It computes the rate you must charge to MATCH A SALARY. That is arithmetic and it is defensible. It does NOT tell you the market rate for your work, because nobody publishes one: BLS surveys employed people and excludes the self-employed, in its own words, and the IRS publishes tax rates rather than prices. What the market will pay you is a different question and this page will not pretend to answer it. One simplification we are telling you about. Self-employment tax has a ceiling: the 12.4% Social Security half stops at the annual wage base, and above that only the 2.9% Medicare half continues. On the occupations in the select above, every median sits below that ceiling, so the flat 15.3% is right. If you are aiming much higher than a median salary, your effective rate is lower than this page assumes and the rate you need is slightly less. We would rather tell you that than quietly overstate it. And income tax is not in here. This page is about the gap between employment and self-employment, and income tax falls on both. Our self-employment tax calculator handles the rest.

Where every number above comes from

Wage data

BLS, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, national. Graphic designers (SOC 27-1024): median $30.27/hr, $62,960/yr. Writers and authors (27-3043): $36.98/hr, $76,910/yr. Web developers (15-1254): $44.54/hr, $92,650/yr. Film and video editors (27-4032): $36.26/hr, $75,420/yr. Public relations specialists (27-3031): $35.94/hr, $74,750/yr. Photographers (27-4021): $21.47/hr, $44,660/yr
bls.gov
Wage data

BLS, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics FAQ: 'Does OEWS have occupational employment estimates that include the self-employed? No.' This is why the wage above is the wage of the job you did NOT take, which is the right comparison for this page
bls.gov
IRS

IRS, Self-Employment Tax (Social Security and Medicare Taxes). The rate is 15.3%: 12.4% for Social Security and 2.9% for Medicare, levied on 92.35% of net earnings from self-employment. An employee pays half of this and the employer pays the other half
irs.gov

What this assumes, and where it could be wrong

Every one of these is a place the number could be off. They are here because you should be able to check our working, not because we are hedging.

The billable share is the number everything turns on, and it is yours.

Sixty percent is a common working figure and it is a default, not a finding. No federal source measures how much of a freelancer's week is invoiced. Set it to what is true for you, and if you genuinely bill every hour you work, set it to 100.

This computes the rate that MATCHES A SALARY. It is not a market rate.

Nobody publishes what a freelancer should charge. What this page does is arithmetic: given the wage of the job you did not take, and the tax you now pay in full, and the unpaid hours, here is the number that leaves you level. What your market will bear is a separate question.

Self-employment tax has a ceiling, and above a median salary this page slightly overstates it.

The 12.4% Social Security half stops at the annual wage base; above it only the 2.9% Medicare half continues. Every median in the select sits below that ceiling, so the flat 15.3% is right for them. If you are aiming a long way above a median, your effective rate is lower and the rate you need is a little less than this page says. We would rather tell you than quietly overstate.

Income tax is not in here, deliberately.

This page is about the gap between employment and self-employment, and income tax falls on both sides of it. The self-employment tax calculator on this site handles the rest.

The wage is a MEDIAN, so half the people in that job earn less.

And it varies widely by state. It is the number you are trying to match, not a promise about what you are worth.

Frequently asked questions

What should I charge as a freelancer?

At minimum, whatever leaves you level with the salaried job you did not take, and that is about twice the staff hourly wage. A graphic designer on staff earns $30.27 an hour, and to end up with the same money freelancing you need to bill somewhere around $69. Three things do it. You pay both halves of payroll tax (15.3% on 92.35% of net earnings, where an employee only ever pays half). You do not bill forty hours a week, because the selling and the invoicing and the bookkeeping are unpaid. And you buy the laptop, the software and the insurance that an employer used to buy without ever showing you the bill. Put your own working weeks, billable share and expenses in above and the page will give you your number.

Why do I have to charge double my old salary rate?

Because your old salary rate was never what you cost your employer. On top of it they paid the employer half of payroll tax (7.65%), your holidays, your sick days, your laptop, your software, your insurance and your desk, and they paid you for the hours you spent in meetings and on admin, which nobody now pays you for. Take all of that away and hand it to you, and the number you have to bill goes up sharply. It is not a markup. It is what employment was quietly costing somebody all along.

What is self-employment tax and why is it 15.3%?

It is Social Security (12.4%) and Medicare (2.9%), levied on 92.35% of your net earnings from self-employment, which works out at about 14.13% of profit. Everyone pays it. The difference is that when you are employed, your employer pays half and you pay half, and only your half appears on your payslip. When you are self-employed there is nobody to pay the other half, so you pay all of it. This is the single biggest reason the naive rate (your old salary divided by 2,080 hours) is far too low.

Is this the market rate for my work?

No, and we are not going to pretend it is. Nobody publishes what a freelancer should charge: BLS surveys employed people and explicitly excludes the self-employed, and the IRS publishes tax rates rather than prices. What this page computes is arithmetic, not a market: given the wage of the job you did not take, this is the number that leaves you level. If your market will not bear it, that is genuinely worth knowing, and it is not a fault in the sum. It usually means the honest answer is to raise the rate, work more billable hours, or accept that you are earning less than the staff job paid.

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